“A clever person solves a problem. A wise person avoids it.” - Albert Einstein
The travel begins
The busyness of our November-December schedules abruptly came to an end as we packed our bags and headed out the door for a quick two-week trip to the US. It didn’t begin well as the taxi company mistakenly sent a small car to pick us up (rather than the van that was booked). As we stood in the evening rain, clock ticking, uncertainty about the Nairobi traffic jams awaiting us, we decided on the clown car option and stuffed ourselves and suitcases inside the best we could and off we went.
It turned out to be a minor inconvenience, but it was unnecessary.
Unfortunately, it would not be the last of this journey.
We eventually caught our midnight flight to Paris. As much as I love the city, I detest flying through its airport.
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| Nearing midnight and waiting to board in Nairobi. |
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Interestingly, I had begun a blog entry a couple months ago about how the French, generally speaking, are not great at organizing things. I realize that I have French friends that both disagree and agree with this. But it’s my perspective. I have spent enough time in France and working with French institutions to see how this plays out. I think what happens is that you have bureaucracies that make sense to insiders and, if you are accustomed to them, you don’t question them. Seeing them as an outsider can sometimes provide a helpful perspective.
The blog was initiated by the chaotically organized parent-teacher meetings a couple months ago. Before I was able to finish it, our recent episode at Charles de Gaulle Airport (CDG) in December brilliantly captured the essence of what I was going to say. So before recounting the dramas traveling through Paris, let me digress and set the stage with my original rant.
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The education system
I'll start with the French school system. Here is a list of the first five grades of primary school: CP, CE1, CE2, CM1 and CM2. Numbering from one to five just isn’t clear enough apparently. I realize that the desire is to provide more clarity as to what each level represents, but in most countries that's implied in the number. Anyway, that's not the biggest issue. From CM2, the numbering proceeds in reverse. From CM2 you are in 6th, then 5th, 4th, 3rd, 2nd, 1st and finally T (terminale). Again, if you grew up with the system, you don’t really question it. It’s obvious that advancing in your education means that number 1 is followed by the number 2, unless you are in secondary school when the number one 1 is preceded by 2.
Then there was the parent-teacher meetings. In addition to the comically unrealistic 7-minute sessions, the process began by providing parents with a document listing the rooms where the teacher will be. Another document provided the schedule of all the appointments. Why combine/simplify the information when you can make a scavenger hunt out of something that everyone is taking time out of their schedules to do.
There are so many small things that come up where you think, this is a different way of thinking.
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CDG
If you’ve traveled through Paris-Charles de Gaulle airport, then I don’t really need to say anything more. You’re already aware. If you haven’t, give yourself some time if you are transferring there.
It starts out easy enough. You have three terminals: 1, 2 and 3. Most of the action happens in terminal 2, which is subdivided as 2A through 2G. But that’s where things start to get a bit crazy.
For example, 2B, 2D and 2F are in the same building. A weary
traveler would think that they could take their rollie on a short walk from
terminal 2A to terminal 2B. Nope. 2A, 2C and 2E are in a separate building. 2G
is off on its own in yet another building. Terminal 2E for some reason has K gates (not 2K,
just K) and there are some gates in two other buildings called L and M. Where do the labels K, L and M come from? No one knows. Why are they located between 2E and 2G? I have asked
French friends these questions and they either shrug their shoulders or laugh
or both. But if the departures board says you are leaving from a K gate for example, there is no intuitive way to know that it will be in 2E.
I assume that it’s like Las Vegas where they intentionally design things to be confusing to make you so tired of trying to find the exit, you stop and rest up at the craps table. Maybe CDG is trying to make it so complicated that you give up, miss your connecting flight, buy expensive food and stay in a hotel.
These are not obscure examples. This is the country’s school
system. It is the country’s main airport. These are prominent institutions. And I have loads of other examples.
* * *
Back to our travels...
I joked about this with my family while we were navigating our way though CDG after arriving there from Nairobi. Silly me. The airport would soon take its revenge.
After meeting up with a friend of ours for a cappuccino and a croissant in our departure terminal, we made our way to the boarding area. The gate didn’t have a jet bridge so we painstakingly, and slowly, boarded buses to get to the airplane. It does seem odd that they wouldn’t be set up better for a major flight from France to the US but who am I to complain.
The bus dropped us off at a stairwell which would allow us to climb up to a jet bridge and board the plane. While we were making our way down the aisle to our seats, we heard the flight attendant announce that the plane we were boarding was heading to Boston. We were heading to Detroit. Chaos ensued. The bus had taken about 50 passengers to the wrong plane.
Confused, we were told to disembark but we weren’t allowed to leave the bridge. Stuck in limbo, we stood and waited for more information. At this point, all hope of making our connecting flight in Detroit was dashed.
We were tired due to lack of sleep during the previous night flight and as the wait went on and on (with no place to sit), Kinaya broke down in tears. Airport staff kept talking on their radios, but no information was forthcoming. Thankfully, their conversations were in French so I could track what was being said. They seemed to be as confused as we were.
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| The longest I've ever been stuck on a jet bridge. |
Eventually another bus came to retrieve us. We made our way back down the stairs with our carry-ons and squeezed into a single bus. We were then told the brutal news that we would need to be taken back to the terminal, rather than our airplane, and be subjected to security all over again given international aviation rules regarding passengers who have disembarked from an aircraft.
I don’t fully understand the rule since we had just gone through security and, though we walked onto the airplane, we hadn’t traveled on it. We boarded for less than two minutes and we hadn’t even sat down. Technically, we did disembark though. The disorganization of CDG was comical, though no one was laughing.
Eventually the bus began moving. I was sick to my stomach at the thought of heading back to the terminal and going through security all over again, after all the delays and mess so far. It’s that feeling of helplessness when you’re subjected to the consequences of peoples’ ineptitude and you can’t do anything about it. This may have been the worst treatment my wife and I have experienced since we had to spend the night on the floor of the airport in Amsterdam in December 2010 (while Priya was pregnant). To be fair, in Amsterdam there was snow.
After driving for about two minutes, the bus stopped. We didn’t move for some time and I began to wonder if someone was making a decision about whether we would indeed need to return to the terminal or if they felt that we had been punished enough and they were going to take us straight to our airplane. Apparently I wasn’t the only one. Rather than turning left towards the terminal, the bus made a right turn and a somewhat muted cheer could be heard as we believed that we were finally heading to the aircraft.
Our assumption was correct and soon we were finally boarding the correct plane. We filed past all of the angry and frustrated passengers who had been sitting and waiting this whole time for our group to eventually find our way to the plane. I don’t blame them. I would be angry if I were them, though I wasn’t sure how much they were told about what had happened to us.
* * *
The flight was pleasantly uneventful. Initially, my Delta app showed that we were automatically re-booked on a flight the next morning, which meant we would need to spend the night in Detroit. I had mixed feelings about that. While I didn’t want to waste a night in a hotel given how short out vacation would be, I also knew that we were going to be exhausted and a bed, sooner rather than later, was also appealing. Over the course of the flight, I noticed on the app that our flight changed again to a “new” flight late that evening. The good news was that we would likely make it to Louisville without needing a hotel. The bad news was that we would have yet another flight and a long layover in Detroit waiting for it.
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I love France. It’s an amazing country where I have had many, many fond memories. You just can’t be good at everything.
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